Orry-Kelly: The Star Designer Gets His Due

How refreshing to see the vibrant showmanship of Australian films like Priscilla, Queen of the Desert captured in a documentary.

This is especially appropriate considering the subject: Orry-Kelly was costume designer who made his way from Down Under to Hollywood and ended up working on such legendary films as 42nd Street, Casablanca, Arsenic and Old Lace, An American in Paris, Oklahoma!, Some like It Hot, and Auntie Mame among his 300-plus credits. If that doesn’t impress you, he also took home three Oscars and Cary Grant (allegedly the pair were lovers for years). There are plenty more famous names dropped throughout the film, over the course of which director Gillian Armstrong finds playful and inventive ways to tell the story — including incorporating language from Orry-Kelly’s own memoir, which was just published last year. THE WORD: A delightful and overdue film about an extraordinary life in pictures. WHERE TO WATCH: Home Video